Chapter 5D: The Remaining Glennie Daughters: Mary Ann, Elizabeth and Margaret

Mary Ann, Elizabeth and Margaret

Virtually all I know about the remaining Glennie daughters of my great grandparents Glennie is from Uncle Charlie’s History and several of Alexander’s poems.

The 3 sisters shared some aspects of their lives, yet they and their fates were more different than similar. Of the 3, Mary Ann and Margaret married, while Elizabeth remained single. Margaret remained in Scotland while the others migrated to Massachusetts. Both Mary Ann and Margaret had 8 children and each lost one to death as casualties in France during World War I.[1]

Mary Ann, the eldest of the siblings after John, married Robert Fyfe, almost surely in Scotland. She arrived in North Andover in 1900, making her the last of the Glennies to be on site, but I am not sure of the date of her immigration to America. She therefore may or may not have been the last of the Glennies to leave Scotland. Her stay in North Andover was apparently brief, and she and Robert moved to Lawrence, then Melrose, finally settling in Reading, all in Massachusetts. Mary Ann died in 1931, achieving the then advanced age of 77. All her children, except for Charles who was killed in France, lived at least well into adulthood (All were living at the time Uncle Charlie wrote his History.) and possibly into old age.

Alexander dedicates two poems[2] to Mary Ann, the first of a celebration, Family Reunion at Mary Ann’s Three Score and Ten. The poem, several fragments of which appear below, begins with a fond reminiscence of their childhoods at Lochrie and concludes with reflections about Mary Ann and the condition of life that comes with aging.

The bonnie glen, the haughs so fine

Are just as livin in my mind

As in the days o’ aul lang syne

When we were lads and lasses

Ad mony a battle since then we’ve fought

And ups and downs we’ve had a lot

But fint a ane o’s hae forgot

The hills and braes and mosses.

Them happy days are lang since gane

To never mair return again

And a’ we’ve left is just our ain

The best hae gane afore us

Father and Mither, the finest pair

That ever raised a family there

Willie and Isle[3] sick and sair

Hae joined the silent chorus.

Now ane and a’ we’re idnet gaun

We’re following ye Mary Ann

To that mysterious shadowy lan’

Whence nane returneth ever

So couthy be yer but an ben

And may yer three-score years and ten

Be but the start and nae the en’

O’ yer journey to the river.

Alexander Glennie

In a far more somber poem entitled Mary Ann, Alexander writes of his sister shortly before her death. By then, Mary Ann’s life, always hard, has become one of relentless suffering. However, she is one to be remembered for her lifelong virtues.

Aged, and helpless, and stooped and thin

Like faded parchment her wrinkled skin

Sight and hearing and speech nigh gone

The fires burn low, but she still fights on,

Oh Sister o’ mine, What a World of pain

Of sorrow and heartache and struggle and strain

Have been your lot, since you first drew breath

And now you wait at the Gates of Death.

Oh Sister of mine, What a joy you’ve been

With your quenchless courage and faith serene

Though soon at rest must your body lie

Your triumphant spirit can never die.

Alexander Glennie

Not much is reported about Elizabeth, and, sadly, I do not remember her ever being discussed. She immigrated to North Andover with the last of the Glennies in 1887. She kept house for John for some years and later for Uncle Charlie and his family. She eventually moved to Reading, Mass., where she died in 1937 at age 74. She is described in the History (along with Isabella) as a “fine Christian” woman, “devoting all of (her life) for the good of (her) friends and relatives.” Alexander devotes a poem to "Lizzie," which seems a fitting tribute to her except for ending with a reference to her as a "Mother". Because of the position of the poem among others who clearly refer to family members, the absence of any other "Lizzie" and the nature of the poem itself, I suspect that Alexander uses the term "Mother" figuratively in the poem, referring to her helping raise the children of John and Charles when she was with their families as what Uncle Charlie calls a "housekeeper". Here is, "Lizzie":

Like a star she shine resplendent
In the circle of her home
Like a diamond in a pendant gem impearled
She holds her home and family
In the hollow of her hand
She's the finest little Mother in the World.

Alexander Glennie

Margaret’s migration was the shortest, limited to moving to Glenbucket, Aberdeenshire upon her marriage. She became the wife of James MacGregor of Glenbucket, and counted Frederick, whom I came to know and like immensely, among her children. (I’ll have more to say about Fred when describing my first visit to Scotland when I stayed with him and his wife, Jessie, in Bella Beg.) Margaret did not leave Scotland, except for one trip to France to visit the grave of her son, Alexander, killed in World War I. While only one of her children died in infancy, 4 others predeceased her. Two of Margaret’s children, Mabel and Caroline, migrated to North Andover, married and lived there as next door neighbors. Margaret died in 1927, at 62 years.

We do not know much about Margaret’s persona from family records, but Alexander, ever ready with quill, writes of her marriage day as marked with a feast and raucous celebration. In Maggie’s Wedding, he describes the scene:

Oh Hae ye heard the latest news

That’s gaun like fire fae hoose to hoose

How Randy Meg has ta’en the vows

To Jamie wi’ the e’en

Yestreen they had the marriage spree

And lads andd lasses merrily

Came far and near to haud their glee

The like was never seen.

The Parson usually can spare

An hour length grace and maybe mair

This time cut short and wi’ an air

I hardly ca’ divine

He grabbed a speen and started in

At this the others did begin

Then oot they bundled to the laft

In pairs to music sweet and saft

And to the fleer they flew like daft

To outdo ane anither

Then lap and sprang the Duke of Fyfe

And Randy Meg was thumpin rife

My father he got Tollie’s wife

And Tollie got my mither.

They roun came stately Gobly Gates

Wi’ baunchin Jennie Brodie

And Lairg was snoring on the seats

And Drum was drinkin toddy

Wi’ dancin and prancing

They loupit and they flang

Wi’ stampin and rampin

The very rafters rang.

Alexander Glennie

And so it went until:

Wi’ toddy they broke up the ball

And started to gae hame

But how they managed to get there

Was to themselves a mystery

And ragin heads and stammocks sair

Revealed the forenicht’s history

For quiet I say it

The most of them were fu’

Some cheery, some beery

Some rennin o’er the moo.

Alexander Glennie

Alexander wrote 2 poems to “Marjory”, but I am unclear about whether they were intended to honor Margaret. As you will see, they are written for someone who living with the family most likely as member. Margaret, as the youngest sister, seems the most likely target, but there was no “Marjory” in the household and Margaret’s nickname was Maggie. Nevertheless, I find the poems delightful, and unusual for Alexander in the affection and joy they express. So, here they are, even though we cannot be sure of the subject.

To Marjory

There’s always lots of pretty Girls, but always one the best

And many pretty faces, but one, the prettiest

So fair and happy be your days, your skies be clear and blue

For of all the Girls in the World, the nicest one is YOU.

Alexander Glennie

In another affectionate poem, he celebrates Marjory’s impending marriage.

To Marjory When Married

Oh Marjory, my Marjory

And must you leave your home and me?

Your lovely smile no more I’ll see

Marjory, my Marjory.

It seems I saw you yesterday

A laughing little child at play

Now Husband, Home, and family

Will seem so strange for Marjory.

But since ‘tis so, it must be so

So bless your heart whereere you go

And Fortune smile on thine and Thee

Marjory, my Marjory.

Alexander Glennie

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[1] Alexander memorialized each of his sisters’ sons’ deaths in poems: To Alec Macgregor Slain in Battle and Charles G. Fyfe…Killed in Action.

[2] A comparison of the syntax of the poems shows Alexander writing the first of the 2 poems phonetically in the Scottish dialect of English as the setting is for the most part years earlier in Scotland. In the second, when the setting is implicitly in the US where Mary Ann resided during then contemporary times, he writes in a universal style of English.

[3] William and Isabella